Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
The End of the Ladder No Conversion Policy?
A recent planning decision has made me wonder whether we're about to see the erosion of the Ladder no conversion policy.
I'm not, at this point, making the argument one way or the other, but, if I have things right here, it seems that we're in danger of policy being made on the hoof and I'd like to see some local discussion and consultation before that happens.
Tags for Forum Posts: no conversion policy
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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To be fair, Hugh - as I thought I'd posted before - Mr Marc Dorfman left Haringey some time ago. So it's possible that this lapse in responding in a timely way to David Schmitz happened during a changeover of staff.
However, it's entirely fanciful to imagine that councillors always have information freely available and aren't "stonewalled" from time to time. It's always been pretty bad, and in the last five years or so has got far worse. (I've heard similar views from former journalists with the local press - when it had the resources to function as such.) This is one reason I decided to stand down as a councillor - and to plan for a new role as uncouncillor, working from outside.
But having written that, it all depends on which department and which staff teams. The best Haringey staff have no problem whatever sharing both information and their professional judgement with members of the public and councillors. (Which doesn't necessarily mean "agreeing with"!)
In that spirit, can I suggest you and other Ladder residents concerned about these issues ask your active councillors to arrange a meeting with you, them, and Mr Stephen Kelly the new Assistant Director for planning.
(Tottenham Hale ward councillor)
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Permalink Reply by Hugh on
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To be even fairer, Alan, I can't believe that you're suggesting that the departure of a head of a department is justification for failure? (You're not, are you, because you then go on to say that it's always been pretty bad and has got far worse recently......actually so I'm afraid I don't really understand what you are saying about Dorfman's departure).
My comment about the response to councillors comes from my own experience of working for two London Boroughs back in the Eighties. However, I accept that things may have changed since then. My perceptions obviously hadn't caught up.
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Then, Hugh, let me be clear about what I am saying.
Firstly, as you pointed out, there are two issues. There's what you called the presenting issue - decisions about particular properties. Then there's the failure by Planning to respond properly and promptly to David Schmitz as one of the ward councillors.
My comment about Marc Dorfman relates to the fact that I don't assume either privately and certainly not publicly that one person was to blame. That's rarely the case. And it's not because I hold some brief for Mr Dorfman. I don't. It's simply about fairness.
I also strongly suspect that a possible failure in the planning process - if that's what it is - may have more than a single cause. Factors recently producing worse planning decisions have included loosening-up planning law; and cuts to local councils which mean that fewer staff carry the same or an increased volume of work.
Neither of which is "justification" for mistakes, or delays. Nor for poor systems and inadequate policies leading to poor decisions. If that's what happened.
I also suspect that in Haringey some poor planning policy decisions may have set precedents for even worse to come. Examples include tower blocks - and I mean 12 to 20 storeys, not 6 or 8. Also agreeing that owners and landlords in some areas can convert buildings with fewer controls. As one of the residents said at the meeting last Monday, in some parts of London we seem to be returning to the 1950s with families living in grossly overcrowded conditions. Plus repeating the towerblock misery of the past.
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Permalink Reply by Alexander Smith on
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What I can’t understand, David, is where this size “exemption” from restricted conversion area rules comes from, as I haven’t seen it in HSG11 or anywhere else in our UDP, especially when there are other Restricted Conversion Areas mostly made up of much larger houses, e.g. Crouch End. Are you sure it’s not the planning officers making up their own rules? Don't you think that planning officers are exceeding their delegated authority when they overrule the UDP. I do, and so I think that when they decide a case is exceptional (and that obviously shouldn't be very often) it should go before the Planning Committee. As for citing lack of demand (in London!!??) as a reason for approval when the property owners couldn't get a price they considered acceptable, it just looks outrageous and proof of a no sale cannot mitigate it.
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My guess would be, as you've mused, Alexander, that the officer took it upon himself to make an exception and referred back to borough-wide guidance which does use a 120 figure. And this is my point, when is there a case for an exception to be considred and on what basis should the exception decision be made?
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Permalink Reply by Dick Harris on
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Hiya Hugh,
I venture nervously into this subject for fear of falling out with any of my HoL friends and neighbours. It is clear from the tone of some contributions to this thread that it would be hard to suggest any changes to a house without offending someone or other.
The double fronted house at 174 Wightman Road is very similar to my own so I have a personal interest in the way that case was handled. When it came up for public consultation, I commented in favour of the proposed conversion because I thought the case was very well argued and presented and also that the survey of parking in the immediate locality accorded with my own impression of the facts. The resulting pair of houses also seems a lot better than any of the other eight houses of similar original layout that can be found elsewhere in the same street.
When, in the 1980s, I considered selling my house, the only offers I received were from developers who clearly wished to sub-divide it. I did not like what I heard of their plans and so made my own (which were approved but have not been implemented). The point here is that, not all conversions are the same. There are good ones and bad ones and a wide range in between and we should be able to rely on the Council at least to prevent bad ones.
When I bought my house, in 1979, we removed four additional kitchens that had been installed in the 1960s to create self-catering but not self-contained units. This suggests that the previous occupants found the place too large for a single family and this is hardly surprising. In 1911 there was a family of eight people living here – two parents in their sixties, five unmarried children between 22 and 31 and one teenager (six of them working). Given expectations today, that same group of people might reasonably prefer to occupy one three bedroom house and four studio flats and this aligns nicely with the fact that the average UK household size today is less than two. Actually, in terms of floor space alone, those five units could be fitted into a house like 174 but that was not proposed. Perhaps we can only keep ladder houses as they originally were if loads of small units are being constructed somewhere else.
Concern about badly managed properties led recently to new rules on HMOs and this may well improve some cases. However, another possible result of these new rules may be that the owners of houses that had been set up as bed-sits or had been illegally converted will be now looking for new solutions. These solutions are not likely to be restoring the buildings to their original status as single family houses. A rush of conversion cases might simply be a consequence of the new HMO rules.
I certainly don’t envy the planning officials their task of handling this work, especially if it has to be conducted against a background of reflex negative comments. Let’s not forget either that, in addition to responding to the housing crisis, today’s officials have to work with the legacy of what the previous three or four generations of owners in the ladder have left after a century of occupation. This probably includes messes left behind by past mistakes or neglect.
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All makes sense, Dick. As I've said a few times in the foregoing, it's the individual case, but the process followed and the precedent it may set. 174 is a big house and converting it to two properties gives two average size Ladder houses.
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I’m afraid I have to disagree with you once again, Hugh, about the size. The officer’s report says: “The ground floor unit is 68sqm and the first floor unit is 64sqm”. Also that house is actually on the pretty small side when compared with most in the Crouch End & Muswell Hill restricted conversion areas which, incidentally, are not big enough for many new owners lately who will often extend. These days each child is expected to have their own room (unlike in 1911 when working class children commomly shared a bed) , and the better off expect ensuite bathrooms, a home office etc.
But I do agree that this is not really the point. What rankles most with me, too, is not the final decision but the way in which it was reached. Perhaps some could argue that the UDP needs changing, but it still stands and was decided democratically by our Council of elected representatives (subject to approval by the Secretary of State of an elected government). Why can it then be glibly dismissed by the unelected officials delegated to consider applications?
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They should at the very least in both cases have dealt fully with all relevant planning guidelines. They did not. In one case that failed abysmally. In the other they fell short of the mark. My question remains. Are we happy for planning decisions to be taken in this casual and arbitary fashion?
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Thanks for taking trouble to put me right Tris. Silly me for expecting even basic facts in the officer’s report would be accurate! But I nevertheless beg to differ on your other points.
The risk of “Under occupation” you mention would surely be that the house might have been lived in by a family able to afford a bit more space for a guest bedroom, ensuite bathrooms and, perhaps an office or games room. Would that be wrong? Should the better off be discouraged from living in Harringay by the meanness of its dwellings and confined to more expensive areas like Crouch End etc?
Another scenario you would, perhaps, find more acceptable, could have been its use as a comparatively affordable home by a large, perhaps extended, family – plenty of these do exist.
As for the risk of “illicit” conversion or use as an HMO, that can happen in any house and is an issue for enforcement not planning. It doesn’t make sense to say “we have to give permission or they’ll do it anyway”.
It's also my view that the decision certainly goes against the restricted conversion policy of the Unitary Development Plan since, as homes under 120m2 are protected by another, completely separate one, it's obvious that the policy was to preserve larger homes. And doesn't this finally prove my point? - The house, although big for Harringay is still only average for the more westerly Restricted Conversion Areas I mentioned, and even for Stroud Green, especially as the upper floor is a loft conversion and almost certainly post 1948. If houses of this size are fair game then those other areas are without purpose.
Finally I think "bending the rules" by officers is a very bad thing. It loses them the respect of the public and has even led to suggestions of corruption on this forum. I, personally, do not believe there have been bungs etc. though I'm sure the officers come under pressure in other ways which do not carry so much blame.
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I’ve now studied the plans more carefully and the house is, as I thought, not nearly so big as some people are claiming.
To calculate floor area for conversions SPG3a says: “A.2. To measure internal floor area, exclude outside walls but include inside walls, partitions, cupboards and chimney breasts and take into account only floorspace with an existing headroom of 2.3m (7.5ft) minimum.”
The house should therefore have been counted as 2 storey, each roughly 75m2. There was a coal cellar (low headroom & anyway not habitable) & also 2 walk-in-loft box rooms (original) but with max headroom at the roof apex of only 2.2m.
So, yes, @ 150m2, it was a bit larger than the average Ladder house, but hardly outsize.
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